Large Reading family, which includes 11 children and 37 grandchildren, tied by their strong values

The Cooper family

These are Joseph and Annie Mae Cooper's 11 children, all of whom have settled close to home unless otherwise noted:

Anna Childs

Stanley Cooper

Janet Cooper

Paul Cooper (resides in Dallas)

Leatha Butts

Starr R. Fleming

Randolph Cooper (resides in Omaha, Neb.)

Gloria Cooper

Penny Templin

Dorisa Cooper

Don Juan Cooper

In addition, there are 37 grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren.

Reading, PA —

As the oldest of 37 grandchildren in the Cooper family of Reading, Ryan Cooper grew up knowing what was expected of him.

“I couldn't go anywhere and do something without it getting back to South Fourth Street, bad or good,” the 41-year-old said last week while visiting his grandfather, 91-year-old Joseph Cooper, who still oversees the family homestead.

Ryan's mother, Leatha, is one of 11 children raised by Joseph and the late Annie Mae Cooper (she died in 1999). They lived along Gilson Alley, a one-block stretch bordering Reading Iron Playground, before moving to South Fourth Street in 1968, three years after their youngest children, twins Dorisa and Don Juan, were born.

In their children, Joseph and Annie Mae instilled values that would serve them well:

Hard work.

Discipline.

Family.

Faith.

Education.

They were a team. She managed the homefront while he worked hard to provide for the family.

“When I played (basketball) for Reading,” said their oldest son, Stan, “my dad didn't see me play that much, because when he came home from work he was tired and went to bed. My mom, she came to see me play. All the discipline in the house wasn't done by my father. My mother did all the discipline.”

She also instilled in them the value of learning and getting a degree.

“My mother always said she wanted us to have a better education than she had,” said Anna, the oldest sibling, “so she would instill that in us: that in order to achieve, you need to have knowledge.”

“You knew you didn't act up in school,” said their sister Gloria. “First, foremost and always, school first.”

By and by, all of Joseph and Annie Mae's children graduated from Reading High School and went on to complete college or trade school.

“I knew I was going to college since junior high school, because all my brothers and sisters did,” Dorisa said. “I was following their example. There was no pressure. ... It was a natural thing for me to do. I think the foundation my sisters and brothers and mother and father laid, I already knew what I needed to do in life.”

But Dorisa didn't represent the end of the line. Not by a long shot.

“I'm the first grandchild,” Ryan said, “and I had Don Juan and Dorisa — the bar was set for them. And immediately, as the next generation, it was instilled in me that you're a Cooper, and this is what we do, this is what we don't do.”

'Deacon' Cooper

Joseph Cooper was born in Florence, S.C., and came to Reading in 1949 to live with his uncle. He was 21.

One Sunday soon thereafter, his cousin Elizabeth invited him to join her for services at Mount Zion Church of God in Christ, 626 Spruce St., which set the course for the rest of his and his family's lives. Two years later, he became a deacon at Mount Zion, and he has been one ever since.

For the Cooper children, that little church a few blocks away was like a second home.

“It was always God, family, work and school,” said Stan, who starred for the Red Knights in the mid-'70s. “My mother and father were always very religious, so that set the table as far as how we communicated with each other and with the world around us. We went to church sometimes three days a week. Myself, I went probably five days a week. I was a lot badder than everybody else.”

When he and Anna were finished laughing over that notion, Stan added, seriously: “Sometimes seven days a week.”

He recalled the time in first grade when he went home for lunch and decided he wasn't going back to school for the afternoon. His dad tracked him down on the playground and chased him all the way to the schoolhouse door, then followed him straight into his classroom, where he cast a steely eye down on his wayward son for a good long time.

“I didn't know he could run that fast,” Stan said, again laughing at the memory.

These days, Joe Cooper — they call him Deacon — has slowed down a bit, and his speech is slurred from a stroke, but otherwise he's doing fine.

“His mind is great,” Anna said. “His will is great. He gets up and takes care of himself. He does pretty good. “

His children and grandchildren, many of whom live nearby, are constantly streaming in and out, and are more than happy to assist with whatever he can't do for himself. After all, he's done so much for them.

A superhero

Having worked in the construction trades throughout his life, Joseph could fix just about anything.

“At 85, dad was up on the roof fixing the roof,” Anna said. “He was a handyman. He did things for people. He's a jack of all trades. From construction work, he knows how to lay things down.”

The family regards him as a superhero: the man you could depend upon to help you out of any jam.

In his younger days, he loved to walk, and was well-known around the neighborhood.

“My grandfather, in his heyday, could get from (here) to Penn Street in probably two minutes, if that,” Ryan said. “That's no bull, and we would have to literally run to keep up with him. And when he was moving: 'Hey, Mr. Cooper.' ... 'Hey, Mr. Cooper.' ... 'Hey, Mr. Cooper.'

“I was like, 'Wow, that's my grandfather, and he's getting acknowledgement from these people who I don't know.' But he did something to establish the respect to shout him out in the street when he walked past.”

Ryan said people would approach his Pop-Pop with their problems and he'd offer either words of encouragement or, if necessary, he'd give them “truth.”

“Sometimes truth at the moment may hurt,” Ryan said, “but later on that truth will sink in and it will be something that you needed to hear at the present time.”

He recalled one time when he got in trouble in school and his mother, a single mom, was at her wit's end, so she sent him to see his Pop-Pop. Ryan figured he was getting off easy, because his grandfather had never laid a hand on him. He was more one to talk things out.

“But I lie to you not, that is one of the worst spankings I ever got,” Ryan said. “And after that, I got the four-hour lecture. But the balance I needed as a father figure that my grandfather was to me taught me in the later years you have to do everything right the first time so you don't have to repeat it.

“That's one of the life lessons he's given. There was always love with the discipline.”

Accountability

Ryan said he tried to buck the system in his younger days, but learned quickly that the family wasn't having it.

His Aunt Gloria said accountability was instilled in them dating all the way back to their Gilson Alley days, when the neighborhood was like one big family.

“You had parents up and down that block,” she said. “If you did something upside the block, by the time you got to the bottom of the block your real parents knew it. I'd go home and I'm in trouble.”

So years later, whenever word filtered down to her that her nephew had been acting up at Reading High, there was no hesitation.

And if the message somehow wasn't getting through, there was always the Cooper family fail-safe.

“If it's not working right, we're going to give it to God, and you're going to be with God Monday through Friday, and Saturday night and Sunday morning,” Ryan said. “That is the honest-to-God truth.”

“All-night prayer,” Anna interjected. “Mom would be there and we'd be there.”

ManMustGo

Perhaps the greatest life lesson his grandfather has imparted on Ryan and the others is his famous saying, ManMustGo.

“It became such a phrase that we passed it on to generations underneath us,” Ryan said. “ManMustGo: It's a phrase used for anything. I gotta do another shift: ManMustGo. I gotta study late: ManMustGo. I had to get off work late: ManMustGo. It resonated into 'I'm gonna do it. I have to do it.' “

“Gotta make the donuts,” Anna added. “You have to be a man a do what a man must do.”

Ryan said his female cousins have since adapted it into WomanMustGo.

“These guys, I'm a mixture of all of them,” Ryan said. “I have a characteristic of each and every one of my aunts and uncles, and I have a different connection to each one of them, but it all stems from Joe Cooper and Annie Mae.”

The family's legacy, he said, really sank in when he was fresh out of college and got his first job working with youth at the Police Athletic League, where one of his grandmother's best friends was his superior.

“Joyce Boykins came in and said, 'I'm going to take the Cooper boy because I know he's going to do it right,' “ Ryan said. “That's when I really had to look at my family and what kind of wave they created. And now I'm riding this wave, and I don't want to do anything to disrespect or to tarnish the Cooper name, because I have people underneath me, and they're going to jump on the wave that I jumped on to keep it going.”

The Cooper family

These are Joseph and Annie Mae Cooper's 11 children, all of whom have settled close to home unless otherwise noted: